Novem­ber 1, 2007

Update: Some good news to start: Dr. Maryse Nar­cisse, a lead­ing pub­lic health advo­cate in Haiti, and a mem­ber of the Exec­u­tive Com­mit­tee of the Fanmi Lavalas party, was returned safely to her fam­ily Wednes­day after being abducted on Sat­ur­day night. For more infor­ma­tion, see One Lavalas Offi­cial Freed in Haiti, One Remain­ing (Haiti Infor­ma­tion Project).

Unfor­tu­nately there has been no sim­i­lar good news regard­ing abducted human rights activist Lovin­sky Pierre-Antoine. His case has received more atten­tion, from mem­bers of Con­gress, the press and the United Nations Mis­sion in Haiti. Thanks to every­one who wrote to Pres­i­dent Preval last month. If you have not yet writ­ten, there is still time to make a dif­fer­ence, see the pre­vi­ous alert.

Haiti Debt Can­cel­la­tion Res­o­lu­tion: Rep­re­sen­ta­tives John Olver and Eliot Engel. Thanks to their con­stituents in Mass­a­chu­setts and New York who made calls to their offices. Val Bryant, a Half-Hour for Haiti par­tic­i­pant from Cen­tral Florida

Com­ing Attrac­tions: Insti­tute for Race and Jus­tice on Novem­ber 8. Berke­ley CA will host Build­ing Democ­racy From The Grass­roots: Report Back From HaitiSchool of the Amer­i­cas Watch Vigil (Novem­ber 16–18, Ft. Ben­ning Geor­gia) will fea­ture a work­shop by the Haiti Action Com­mit­tee, and Haiti speak­ers dur­ing the main events.

Is from the Haiti Reborn Project of the Quixote Cen­ter. Haiti Reborn is urg­ing Rep. Spencer Bachus, one of the co-sponsors of H.Res 241– the Haiti Debt Can­cel­la­tion Res­o­lu­tion, and the rank­ing Repub­li­can on the House Finan­cial Ser­vices Com­mit­tee, to bring the bill to the full com­mit­tee for a vote. They need your help on a let­ter to Rep. Bachus, espe­cially if you are a leader of a faith community.

Dear friends,

We are hop­ing to get sig­na­tures from lead­ers from faith com­mu­ni­ties and oth­ers folks by Novem­ber 6 so that we can deliver the let­ter to Bachus next week –hope­fully Wednesday.

This is a let­ter for indi­vid­u­als — but please indi­cate any posi­tion you may hold with a faith com­mu­nity or other orga­ni­za­tion if appropriate.

Please send your sig­na­ture to Tom Ricker at the Quixote Cen­ter at tomr@quixote.org by mid-day (1:00 p.m.) on Tues­day, Novem­ber 6.

Thank you,
Tom Ricker
Haiti Reborn/Quixote Center

******Let­ter fol­lows********
Dear Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Bachus,

We would like to thank you for your lead­er­ship and your con­tin­ued sup­port for debt can­cel­la­tion in Haiti and in other coun­tries. Thanks to your lead­er­ship peo­ple of faith have suc­cess­fully gained an unprece­dented level of sup­port for H Res 241 and the Jubilee Act. We are writ­ing today to encour­age you as the rank­ing mem­ber of the Finan­cial Ser­vices com­mit­tee to move H Res 241 to a vote as soon as pos­si­ble so the peo­ple of Haiti will have the ben­e­fit of debt can­cel­la­tion begin­ning this year.

Time is crit­i­cal. If we act, we can bring life-saving debt can­cel­la­tion to the peo­ple of Haiti nowvul­ner­a­ble

see table). There are other

While it may not be seen as much, a lit­tle money goes a long way. The Hait­ian gov­ern­ment spent a mere $25 mil­lion in health care for 2005–6.

Thank you for your coura­geous lead­er­ship on debt cancellation.

Sin­cerely,
(ini­tial signers)

Rev. William Calla­han
Co-director, Quixote Cen­ter
Marie Den­nis
Direc­tor, Mary­knoll Office for Global Con­cerns
Rev. David Dun­combe, grass­roots advo­cate
Bread for the World and Jubilee USA Net­work
Pat Pel­ham, Vice Chair
Board of Direc­tors, Bread for the World
Tom Ricker
Haiti Reborn/Quixote Cen­ter
Carol L. Ries, SNJM
Coor­di­na­tor, Mid-Atlantic Mis­sion Cen­tre
Kristin Sun­dell, M.Div.
Direc­tor of Advo­cacy and Orga­niz­ing, Jubilee USA Net­work
Elaine Van Cleave, Vol­un­teer Dis­trict Orga­nizer
Bread for the World, Birm­ing­ham, Alabama
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